Family - An Aedion Fic
by Eliniei
Summary: Aedion wants to relieve some of the stress his queen has undertaken and goes on an errand to help with the official wedding plans.


Aedion took a look down the street to make sure that there were no carriages coming along to run him over as he crossed. After waiting for one to pass, he jogged over to the door of a small building. He looked down at the piece of paper in his hand, the name of the place scribbled in his cousin's insufferably illegible shorthand.

He glanced over to the wooden sign that was hammered into the ground. It was white with painted red letters. The name Aelin had written out looked...almost similar to the sign, so he was quite positive he was at the right place.

 _Let's hope so_ , Aedion thought to himself. The official wedding and coronation of the King Consort was in less than two weeks. His poor Queen was up to her eyes in not only planning, but also meeting with her court and counsels. Lysandra and Evangeline were helping but they could only do so much, being part of the court themselves.

That was how he'd ended up where he was at this moment. Aelin had asked him to meet the coordinator for the orchestra that she wanted for her wedding at this little cafe. She'd set up the meeting last week but simply had no time to leave to palace. As fascinating as this little chat about money would be, he couldn't say no to her. He'd spent half of his life thinking she was dead, after all, and they'd been through so much together in the last few years.

"Sir, are you coming inside?" Aedion's head snapped out of the clouds and he looked towards the door. It was now open and a young woman now stood under the frame. She was dressed in some type of gaudy get-up, no doubt the uniform of the establishment.

"Yes," he said after clearing in throat. "I'm meeting someone on behalf of-."

"On behalf of the Queen," she finished. "Yes, of course." The girl nodded and gave a small dip of her head. She headed back inside, leaving the door open for him. He followed her and swung the door shut behind him.

 _What a very Aelin place to meet_ , he thought, looking around at the interior decor. "How did you know?"

"Well, you look just like her, sir," she responded. He nodded in agreement, vaguely wondering how she knew that detail. Finally, she stopped next to a table and folded her hands in front of her. "Here we are."

Aedion took a look at his guest before he approached. The orchestra coordinator sat with her back to him. She was slouched, leaning back in her chair, with one knee resting against the table. Her long blonde hair hung over the back of the chair. She held a small, square dessert plate in one hand with half of a delicate, chocolate pastry sitting on its surface.

 _Not very appropriate as the head of a business._

"Sorry, I'm late. I'm still not very familiar with the…"

As he spoke, the girl dropped her leg to the floor and lifted herself off of the chair. She set the dish on to the table. His already slow pace stopped completely as she started turning to greet him.

 _Wait…_

Blonde hair. Bad manners. Chocolate.

He scoffed as he came face to face with his own cousin. She gave him that mischievous, conspiratorial smile.

Even though he had no idea what was going on.

 _What_ is _going on?_

"Unbelievable."

"Nice of you to join me, dear cousin." Her tone taunted him. As it always did.

"You-"

"Well, sit down already. I've been waiting a quarter of an hour for you and as you know, I'm a very busy woman." She looked towards the waitress, who was still standing by their table. "Please bring us two more of these," Aelin said, motioning towards the cake. "And some tea."

"Of course, your Majesty." Aedion clenched his fists and waited for the girl to leave before he moved to sit.

Once he was settled, she leaned back in her chair again, and lifted her knee to that table again.

"What are you doing here?" he asked as she made herself comfortable. "Don't you think you should act more lady-like?"

"Oh, please, Aedion." She laughed and lifted the plate off of the table again. "You wouldn't have me any other way and you know it."

Well, that was true. He huffed a laugh.

"I thought you were so busy, you couldn't even leave the castle." She popped the other half of the pastry into her mouth.

"I lied," his cousin said, simply, mouth full. He shook his head, smiling slightly.

"What else is new?"

The waitress came back with a silver tray. She delivered one plate to each of them and laid out a tea set. She went to pour the tea into the little cups but the Queen stopped her.

"That's okay, I'll get this." The young woman bowed her head again, and left them alone. Aelin put four sugar cubes into her cup, and then poured a cup for both of them.

Aedion watched her from across the table, thinking about the events that had wound him up here. He had thought she'd been acting strange.

This morning, she'd shoved the paper in his hand, told him the time of the appointment, given him the highest price she was willing to pay them, and pushed him out the back door of the castle early so he could run some errands beforehand. The entire encounter took place in less than three minutes of him walking down the stairs after his meeting.

Now, he suspected she'd done it to make sure she got here before him.

"Aelin," he said, crossing his arms over his chest. "What am I doing here? And where's Rowan?"

She waved her hand in dismissal as she sipped her tea. "He's up on the roof, of course."

"What about the orchestra?"

"Oh, I already took care of that. That was not a lie. He left right before you got here."

"And I'm here because…?"

"Aedion, I needed to discuss something important with you." She took another drink of her tea.

"We couldn't have discussed this at the palace?" She cut her cake in half.

"Well, we could have. But I wanted to come here!" She smiled a toothy smile before devouring the half of the cake she cut. He scowled. "They have the best pastries in the city. I have asked them to cater."

"You know, I can see everything in your mouth as you talk," he said with a sigh. She swallowed, hard.

"I did bring you here on false pretenses, but I think you can forgive me." Aelin set down her fork, leaving the other half of her dessert. "I wanted to ask you a question."

"Okay, so ask."

His cousin sat up straight and laid her arm out on the table, her hand palm up.

"Give me your hand." He eyed her suspiciously.

"You know, you're making this weird." She wrinkled her nose and pouted her lips.

"I'm trying to be serious!"

"Okay, okay," he said, quickly, and placed his hand in hers. "Sometimes I can't tell." She smiled and wrapped her fingers around his tightly.

"Aedion, I want you to give me away at the wedding." His mouth dropped open. He wasn't sure what he thought was going to happen, but this was not it.

He half expected this to be a joke. He felt almost dumbfounded.

"I….what?"

"Well, it's customary that the bride's father walk her down to aisle…"

"Yes, I know normal wedding traditions."

"Since you are my family, I would be very happy if you would do this for me."

He now grasped her hand, but gently. A smile spread across his face.

"Aelin, I would be honored." She returned his smile and placed her other hand on top of his. He thought he could see tears forming in her eyes.

"Thank you," she whispered, her voice almost breaking. He tightened his hand around hers. They sat and watched each other for a few moments longer before Aelin removed her hands. She discreetly wiped the water from her eyes and smiled at him. "Are you ready to head back?" Aedion nodded and stood up from the table. His cousin did the same and patted the crumbs from her tunic. He draped his arm across her small shoulders.

"Maybe next time you shouldn't beat around the bush, huh?" he asked as they headed for the door.

"You know that isn't my style," she retorted. Once they were outside, she snorted. "You should have seen your face." He smiled.

"Couldn't have been any funnier than yours."

The punch she gave his side wasn't hard enough to hurt, but it did knock him off balance. She laughed and grabbed his arm to steady him.

"I love you and your stupid face."

"Okay, now you're definitely making it weird."


End file.
